Squirrel Assist.

Out on a walk this morning I came across a squirrel in the road recently hit by a car. Looking closer I could see rapid breathing and no signs of serious injury except a small hint of blood in its mouth and nose. The poor thing was twitching and making pitiful little noises, and it was in the middle of the road exactly where another car might run it over. I was nervous about getting bit but I couldn't just leave it there, so I carefully picked it up and moved it to a sunny patch of grass.

Poor little squirrel friend continued to twitch and struggle, and I was certain the end was near when it suddenly jumped up and ran a short distance only to collapse on its side again. I watched it for a few more minutes as it repeatedly tried to run and collapse. I went back to my house for a snow shovel hoping I could use it to move the poor squirrel to a more secluded spot.

When I arrived back to the squirrel friend I saw it up on its feet and moving. It ran underneath a van and appeared to crawl up into one of the wheels for shelter. I peeked underneath and I could see its tail hanging down from inside the wheel. I decided against trying to wrestle the injured squirrel out from underneath the van hoping it would recover and exit on its own.

A few hours later I came back to check on squirrel friend and offer some raisins, peanut butter (100% natural), and water. What appeared to be the same squirrel was enjoying some berries at the foot of a tree. I checked underneath the van and happily there was no squirrel inside the wheel. I wasn't 100% sure, but this squirrel under the tree looked pretty much like previously injured squirrel friend. I didn't ask for ID.

I set out the refreshments and whoever this squirrel was enjoyed a luxurious treat. After getting a full belly, squirrel friend retreated to another tree further removed from the road and climbed up onto a branch to rest in the late afternoon sun. I set the remaining food and water in a secluded spot under a nearby bush for whatever critter may enjoy.

I returned home to find Ashley kitty complaining of her own empty bowl, which I remedied immediately. Actually that's a lie. I wrote out a first draft of this blog post and THEN I filled Ashley's bowl. Poor kitty.

- The End -

A Cloud Can Never Die

When you look up into the blue sky on a clear day you may notice that your favorite cloud is gone, and you are sad. You believe that your cloud has died, but a cloud can never die. A cloud can never die, it can only transform. A cloud will become rain, which falls to the ground to nourish the plants and animals. Some of the rain will collect into a stream, which flows into a river, and eventually makes its way to the sea. The sun will then warm the sea, and moisture will rise up into the air. The wind will carry the warm air back to you, and when it cools the moisture will form again into your cloud. A cloud can never die, it can only transform.

Over half of your body is made of cloud. If you take the cloud out of your body there is no YOU left. The clouds that are in your body today were floating in the sky at one time. The clouds in your body were also a part of someone else’s body. The clouds that are in your body have been a part of many different forms of life. When your loved one is gone you can look up into the sky and see them in the form of a cloud. You can wave to them and say, “Hello my little cloud. Hello my dear friend I see you up there in the sky. Have a good time floating free. One day I will join you, and we will float in the sky together.”

(Based on the teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh)

Based on True Events with Poetic License

To Emylee with Inspiration From Emily
Paul Klusman

My friend Emylee says,
"All my poems lately are crap
And I don't want to write poems anymore."
But I feel like a person has good
And bad poems and the bad
Ones have to get written before

The good ones can emerge from
The heart or the mind or the hand
And make their way onto the page
Where they land

So that others can read them sitting there
Sipping coffee, tea, or beer,
Or wine
And tell themselves exactly which poems
Are terrible and which ones are fine.

So I said, "Write them anyway."

And besides who's to say
What is good and what is bad
Even Emily Dickinson wanted all her
Poems burned that she had

Written when she was alive after she was dead
So she must have thought her poems were bad even though people likely said,
"They're better than the poems I've got bouncing around in my head."
So rather than burning Emily's poems they published them instead

And all the world delighted in the thoughts of a quiet reclusive girl
Who's pen could turn a grain of sand into a pearl

Who's verse would only arrive
After she was gone back in the day
And was lucky to avoid... the trap
Of fame when she was alive
And might have been known to say,
"All my poems lately... are crap."

Poetry to an Unknown Friend

To an Unknown

Paul Klusman

In the dark of night
When I'm all alone
When the cold is creeping
And all my friends are flown

I turn to words of wisdom
Sent many years before
By another lonely soul
On a far off distant shore

Across the gulf of time
To reach my weary eye
To offer needed comfort
And light to read them by

This quiet salutation
Lifts my darkened soul
What simple little gift
To make my spirit whole

What kind and lovely grace
To keep me company
To chase away the gloom
And set my spirit free

Now I send a greeting
To join you on your way
My unknown fellow traveller
Of a long and dreary day

As others have before me
Dropped pebbles in a pond
And sent a tiny ripple
Into the great beyond

I make this declaration
Dear reader be it known
This one eternal truth:

That you are not alone

Poetry about Fall

Greeting to Autumn (Not Without Remembrance)*
Paul Klusman

Painting the tops of the tips of trees
With a palette of the colors of fall
As light grows short and the first hard freeze
Autumn comes to call

The last bright days make their final round
While leaves settle gently to the ground
I remember a love, what did become her?

The radio plays, "The Boys of Summer"

When my love's gone, when the radio plays
I will think of past days

Come out with your rakes, come out with your blowers
Tidy your yard with gasoline mowers
Pack the leaves into plastic bags
Throw away nature and fly your flags

On a sunny porch I watch birds and squirrels
As the northern wind gets draft deferrals

Meanwhile, like days going past in late October
Make the nights longer, cold and sober
The sun in his passing will sink down low
Late in the year to make shadows grow

We'll turn our shoulders to coming winter
While fireplace logs crackle and splinter

What a giver has, what a robber lacks
What connects us when we're apart
Like a silent flowing candle wax
The colors warm my heart

*This is a reply to "Greeting to Spring (Not Without Trepidation)" by Robert Lax

A tribute to my dear departed Oscar

A Thousand Suns

Paul Klusman

Over the back of the top of the chair
Over the tops of the tips of your ears
The morning sun warms the cozy spot where
You spent all those happy years

The first bright beam from the eastern sky
Searches blindly where you used to lie
And kindly paints a golden hue
Lovely where I last saw you

Happily sleeping some days before
Now resting there no more

Still, the sun in his running hastens the hour
When a bird sings awake and opens the flower
When heat rises up and ripens the day
Joyfully come what may

What joy you broke your earthly bond
Now shine in the great beyond

Casting your light over the mountains and seas
Over diamonds in the morning dew
Past the horizon and above the trees
Beyond the delirious, burning blue

Sure like a hawk and sweet like a dove
For the elders of daughters and sons
Forever set in the heavens above
You shine like a thousand suns

Poetry. To my cat in his golden years.

Ever More

Paul Klusman

The light arrives on time
Each day to mark the morn
We walk along a line
From the day we are born

Along the winding road
Until the journey's done
Stand before the ocean
To see the setting sun

Your boat is in the bay
And now an evening breeze
To call your soul away
Across the endless seas

And when you do set sail
Towards that distant shore
Your sun then out of sight
I'll love you ever more

A poem to my elderly plucky cat Oscar

Borrowed Time
Paul Klusman

My plucky cat my Oscar now
Is thin and old and yet somehow
He holds his tail in sturdy cheer
And holds the line another year

"How much longer?" I ask my friend,
"Before you face your final end?"
"How many of your nine lives gone?"
"How many suns to greet the dawn?"

He does not answer as cats are wise
And never given to compromise.

Pausing now for self reflection
I consider how, in the other direction
My cat could ask the same of me
How many sunsets might I see?

How did we meet in time and space?
As ever towards our resting place
We step along the daily grind
Side by side 'till one day find

The other gone and walk alone
The other gone and empty home.

But here for now your shining grace
And here for now your lovely face
To fill the hours of the afternoon
To feel your presence in the room

To share the joy of company
To hear the quiet symphony
Of moments passing out of time
Fixed here now in verse and rhyme

And breathing living sitting near
I'm glad that you're still here.

Poetry on a Calm and Quiet Morning

Contento

Paul Klusman

I was sitting still, it was quiet in the room,
I was gazing out the window from morning 'till noon.
A sunbeam crept along the floor of the place,
And bounced off a wall and warmed my face.
The cat ate breakfast and gave himself a bath,
Then slept in the middle of the sunbeam's path.

I was sitting still, it was quiet in the room,
I was gazing out the window from morning 'till noon.
The clouds in the sky hung over the town,
And watched over us as the morning came down,
Against the burning blue, all thin and white,
And drifting and dancing in slow delight.

I was sitting still, it was quiet in the room,
I was gazing out the window from morning 'till noon.
The hours slipped away like grains of sand,
Pouring out of time and sifting through my hand.
I asked the morning, "Should I be somewhere, somehow?"
The morning replied, "Right here and right now."

The Lump Under Covers

The lump under covers
Is where my cat lies
Hiding away from
The cold gray skies

Of winter the second
Month of the year
When scarce is the light
And slim is the cheer

I gaze out the window
At the barren trees
Waving stiff
In the chilly breeze

Now slipping a hand 
To the soft warm fur
My cat replies
With a soft gentle purr

What grace to share
Some comfort somehow
What reason to be
In the here and the now

The days grow longer
We cannot stop spring
Out of the gloom
And born on a wing

A song of hope
What promise to keep
My cat lifts his head
Then falls back to sleep